One way of seeing the photograph of my brother slicing a grapefruit circa 2012
your hands were virgin
no scorpion crawling forearm
no Japanese knuckle
enflamed by my love
grow to be giant
anybody in town
dare speak ill
throats cradled in the jaw
of that cold power
& the snake on your dorsum now
my holy boy
my downtrodden god
all the childish dream
all the embellishment
you rose to
with death
on elbow
always proud
sign of the struggle
twirling shoulder to fingertip now
//
is it the influence of our mutual expectation?
you were once a soft paperclip of a boy
circa 2012
glass joe
I arrive some kind of whitewashed slate
to your apartment one night
we sat out on the fire escape,
one of those special places
where the world swims by
& one may feel a calm distance,
watch the fools game from different light
the new youth gentrifiers were making their first assaults on 25th
every few weeks another faux industrial wash room to get an eight dollar drink opened up
across the way the projects building teetered on the worlds rim
& men sit out in the shadowy courtyard
behind that flimsy iron rod fence
all day long
watch the world swim by
round two a.m.
the road imitates the beach & fish start rolling up on the sidewalk
spilling out from the bright light doorways
into the cold desolate air of clevelan
that special white kind of cold that steals heat from you
even only in thought
freezes the pathetic beard to me face in a matter of seconds
& everyone drunk
loud laugh maybe crying white woman careens into the sidewalk over her step
& an oaf of a boy fumbling to collect a bag of marbles spilled
suddenly remembering where he is
to look over shoulder
before leaning down
we toss pennies into the water
laugh
like we know better
fall back into apartment
pull the mattress to the living room
& sleep like brothers
between the brick walls
of that little cell
the sickness was starting then
back before it was in fashion
& I’m too young
to really know what it means
figured you’d be ok
so long as I checked your pulse now & then
in the morning we made breakfast
you sliced a grapefruit
with peculiar care
enough to make my teeth cold
I thought you were tough
because I remembered you
from before we ever met
& what would you have
of me?